It's a Twin Thing
by phoenixyfriend
Summary: One of the fundamental arguments of human nature is that of Nature and Nurture. If two people, completely identical in the way of Nature, and are otherwise essentially the same person in the way of personality, are suddenly put into two radically different "Nurtures," what are the effects? SI OC
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

Once upon a time, there were two girls. These girls were known, among their family, friends, and acquaintances, as the Barrett twins. They were rarely referred to separately, and few could tell them apart naturally, for the Barrett twins were known for being the rare kinds of sisters that were identical in every way, from bodies to fashion to expressions to personality. They held the same interests, had the same face, dressed the same way, and only ever differentiated for other's sakes by way of small changes to their hair or small accessories.

The twins were seventeen, and average in height. Their bodies were slim but wiry, the results of years of dancing. Their hair was dark brown, shiny and wavy, and reached down to below their shoulder blades, generally tied in low ponytails to the side, unless in a situation where it would get in the way. Their eyes were pale blue, and large enough to be just the slightest bit unnerving.

The girls were normal adolescents in temperament. Overall quite kind, they had the same sarcastic streak that plagued so much of the modern generation. They were rarely separated from each other, and were known to consult each other on all but the most personal matters, and to read and watch everything the other did. They were also known for their skill in dancing, a moderately high intelligence, and for enjoying the intensely disturbing effect they occasionally had on the people surrounding them.

They lived in a small, moderately sized city for most of their lives, and often visited their grandparents on the other side of the country.

The incident that triggered their adventures began then, when the plane crashed in a freak storm, a storm that pulled two girls out of one reality, tore them apart, and tossed them into a new one.

These are the Barrett twins.

This is their story.

**o.o.o.o.o**

**A/N: I will warn you all **_**now**_** that this story is meant to be an exploration of a concept. There will be other major writing tools, but the main aspect of the story is character development in regards to the OCs. Specifically, it is an exploration into how two people who are fundamentally similar can change when put into different places and situations with different expectations of them. For this reason, the OCs were created to be **_**completely identical in every way**_** save for a few small, not-quite-fundamental differences, so that we are essentially watching the same person grow in different ways. I am well aware that the idea of two people being this similar is ridiculous, as is the concept of the plane crash doing what it did, and ask that you take those parts with a grain of salt. Hand Wave them away, if you will.**

**And yes, I am well aware that I didn't mention their names. Simply put, their names don't matter yet. Would it add to the story if you knew them? No. It wouldn't. The prologue is just here to introduce two girls that no one really cares about in the same way that an announcer would introduce a beauty pageant contestant: with a bunch of details that seem unimportant, and may actually be.**

**In any case, I'm done with the obligatory boring start. It's over and done with, and once I post the next chapter, we can actually get to the fun part.**

**Ja ne,**

**Phoenix**


	2. A Dream or a Joke

Hogwarts

"Headmaster!"

Albus Dumbledore looked up from the papers he had been signing, right into the eyes of a frantic Madam Pomfrey. "Ah, Poppy. What can I do for you?"

She was quite flustered, he noted. "I don't know how to explain it, but Hagrid found a girl passed out on the lawn. We don't know who she is, and there are a few things that seem rather… off about her."

That was… odd. Dumbledore stood up from his desk and nodded at the door. "Lead the way."

o.o.o.o.o

The unconscious girl, he found, was not strange herself. There was no strange hair, no ethereal glow, no ancient markings. The circumstances surrounding her, however, were a rather different story.

Her clothing, for one thing, was far too large for her size. The girl was perhaps eleven years old, but her clothing was more suitably sized for an adult woman than a child. The style, too, was unlike any he had seen before, even among muggles. Her belongings had been strewn across the ground by whatever had brought her to Hogwarts, and the items that had fallen out of her bag, especially that which he assumed was technologic in nature, seemed almost alien in their smooth, advanced nature. Still more intriguing, a passport had fallen out as well, showing an older version of the girl, born in a year that had not yet happened. Particularly confusing was the fact that nothing was broken. Not the girl's bones, not her skin, not her belongings, nothing. Everything was in pristine condition, and it confused him greatly.

Nonetheless, he ordered Poppy to take the girl to the Hospital Wing and inform him of when the girl awoke, so that they could ask a few questions. He also promised to inform the ministry, though he had no intentions of doing so until the girl had awoken. The Ministry had a tendency to blow things out of proportion, particularly by involving the Daily Prophet, so he would refrain from telling them anything until such a time as they could get the situation done without quite so much fuss.

Now, to get back to that paperwork…

o.o.o.o.o

Large blue eyes blinked open sometime in the late afternoon of July twenty-third, nineteen ninety-one.

"Oh, good, you're awake." Poppy sighed, relieved. She'd been rather worried when the girl hadn't risen, despite the lack of any major injuries revealed by the diagnostic charms. Thankfully, the girl's unconscious state hadn't lasted more than several hours.

The girl made a small noise, a tiny groan, really, and levered herself up onto her elbows. "Where… where am I?"

She seemed quite confused, and was looking down at herself with a critical eye. She started talking again, with a surprising American accent, before Poppy could answer. "I shrunk."

"What?"

"I… shrunk." The girl, to her credit, seemed to be taking the apparent shrinking quite well. "Last I checked, I was seventeen."

Poppy pursed her lips, rather bemused. Was the girl delusional? "Well, I can assure you that you are eleven at the moment."

The look the girl shot her was rather… displeased. "Yeah, I can tell."

Poppy frowned. The girl was being rather rude, though that could possibly be attributed to—

"The crash!" The girl's eyes grew wide, and she immediately sat up more fully, her eyes darting around and searching for… something. "The plane crashed! Oh, god, what happened? Where— she can't have—but—"

The girl began hyperventilating, even as she tried to get out of the bed to continue looking for her quarry.

"Sit down!" Poppy ordered, putting her hands on the girl's shoulders. "You are in no state to be—"

"_Where's my sister?!_" The cry was loud and panicked, and the girl grabbed onto the lapels of Poppy's dress. "_Where's Eva?_"

Something was obviously wrong with the situation. Poppy poi to the bed. "Calm down."

The girl didn't seem willing to listen to that particular bit of advice. "How can I be calm? Where. Is. My. _Sister? Where is Evangeline?"_

"For Merlin's sake, girl, sit _down_." Poppy hadn't often had to deal with a patient like this. Hysterical patients, yes. Patients who thought they didn't need care, yes. But rarely did she have to deal with someone who was both, and she was at a loss as to how to deal with her.

The girl finally grabbed hold of her temper and sat down, clenching her jaw and visibly glaring at Poppy. "Fine."

There were several tense moments as the girl fought to calm down, her glare slowly lessening over time. In the end, she just gave a defeated sigh. "Alright, then. I'm good now. Just… where's my sister?"

"You were the only one on the school grounds." Poppy drew up a chair and sat down, knowing that there were a few too many things that she couldn't do normally in this situation.

"…The only one?" The girl's hands clenched tightly around the bedsheets by her side, and she hissed out a breath. "That's bull sh*t."

"I assure you that—"

"There was an entire _plane_ that crashed, right in the middle of _Wyoming_. There is _nothing_ in Wyoming. You had to have seen _someone_ other than me." The girl's tone was growing angry now. "Are you _trying_ to mess with me?"

Poppy pursed her lips and sat up straighter. "We are in Scotland, young lady, not the Midwest."

The girl froze, and her eyes widened. "Bullsh*t."

Poppy's eyes narrowed. "I assure you, it most certainly is not."

"There is _no possible way_ that the plane could have crashed in _Scotland_ when we were only flying from Oregon to Florida." The girl's anger was growing again. "Seriously, what is _wrong_ with you if think it's funny to—"

"And there is no way for a girl to lose over half a decade of her life, and yet you claim to have done just that." Poppy cut the girl off, in no mood to discuss things with students in her normal manner. The girl was understandably upset, but she was also acting in a manner that Poppy was finding none-too-pleasant.

The girl's jaw clenched shut, and she looked away, glaring at the wall. After several seconds, the anger fled, replaced once more by fear. "…You said we were in Scotland, right?"

Poppy nodded, even though the girl was turned away from her. "Yes."

"…The name of the building?"

If the girl was a muggle, then telling her would be a bad idea, though… if the girl had gone through such changes as she claimed, it would do little good to keep yet more information out of her reach. "Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

Something in the girl's face _broke_, and she began to laugh. "I thought you looked familiar. Madame Pomfrey, eh? Guess that means this is all just a dream." There was relief there, now.

"How do you know my name?" Poppy stood, almost ready to go get Dumbledore. "And why do you think this is all a dream?"

"Because you aren't _real,_ of course." The girl spoke dismissively. "I'm probably just in a hospital, under some sedatives or something right now, and dreaming this because of the drugs they've stuck me with."

Poppy frowned, standing up. "I will return… soon. Don't move until I do."

"Yeah, sure."

o.o.o.o.o

"She's in denial?" Dumbledore asked quietly, not yet entering into the room.

"No… not quite. Denial would be if she were to simply convince herself against all odds that something was unrealistic. From what I saw, she drew the conclusion of the situation being a dream from what information was available to her. She saw it as the most logical conclusion, not just the most preferable." Poppy replied.

Dumbledore nodded, and without any warning, entered the Hospital Wing. "Hello, young one."

The girl raised an eyebrow in his direction. "Hey."

"You seem to be laboring under the impression that this is all a dream." He didn't really need to elaborate on that fact, or question her, not yet. Simply stating it was enough.

"Are you going to try to convince me that it's not?" The girl tilted her head. "Because there is literally no other possible answer for this that wouldn't convince me I'm going insane."

"I assure you, this is all very real."

"Even if it's only happening in my head?" The girl grinned, as though she had just made some inside joke, but frowned when she noticed that she hadn't gotten some expected response. "No? Don't recognize what I'm…? I hate my dreams."

"You are not dreaming, Miss…?" He trailed off in a polite, if slightly indirect, request for her name.

"Barrett." She answered, almost distractedly. "Let's see… either I'm in some sort of induced sleep, which would suck, or I'm just… hm…"

"Miss Barrett?"

The girl ignored him again, though Dumbledore was fairly certain by this point that it was more out of negligence and dismissal than any true desire to be rude. His eyes drifted off to the side as he began to analyze the possibilities. If she believed it all to be a dream, as she had so far demonstrated, then—

"Son of a _bitch!_" The girl swore loudly, and Dumbledore's eyes snapped back to her small figure. The girl was shaking her hand out, and there were bite marks on it, strong enough to bleed. Judging by the girl's expression, as well as the fact that the two were more or less alone, she had been the one to inflict the wounds herself.

A door slammed open, and Poppy hurried back in, before Dumbledore had done more than even draw his wand to take care of the healing himself. Good. It seemed that Poppy's monitoring charms were doing their job. "Just what do you think you were doing, young lady?"

"Trying to wake myself up." The girl hissed between gritted teeth, still clutching her hand. "Hurt a hell of a lot more than I expected, though."

"Miss Barrett," Dumbledore drew her attention away from Poppy's medical ministrations. "Would you mind explaining why you believe yourself to be in a dream?"

The girl snorted. "Because you're not _real_. I said that already. You're _storybook_ characters from a series we grew up with."

"We?"

The girl flinched. "I… I'm not used to being anywhere without my sister. It's getting to me."

"I see." And he was fairly certain he could understand, in a roundabout way. "Tell me more about this… series."

The girl raised an eyebrow, and then sighed again. "Can't fast-forward, huh? Really starting to get bored with this dream. Fine, um…" She clasped her hands in front of her face, ignoring Poppy's warnings again. "The Harry Potter series, written by J. K. Rowling, chronicles a little over seven years of the title character's life, plus an epilogue. The first book is _Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone_, chronicling Harry's life from his cousin's eleventh birthday to the end of Harry's own first year. Each following book tracks one school year of Harry's life. _Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets_ is the second book. _Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban_ is third. Each following book follows the same title pattern, of _Harry Potter and the_… yadda-yadda-yadda. _Goblet of Fire_ is the fourth. _Order of the Phoenix_ is fifth. _Half-Blood Prince_ is sixth. _Deathly Hallows_ is seventh."

Dumbledore's kindly expression closed off little by little as the girl spoke, and by the end his expression was almost stony. There were things in her speech, such as the connection between Harry's first year, just a few months away, and the Philosopher's Stone, which Nicholas had only just asked him to help protect, that few people outside of those directly involved should have known about. If the rest of her information was just as accurate, he needed to know. And if the girl came from another dimension, as she claimed, she would have nowhere to go. Information was a currency just like any other, and if the girl was willing to tell what she knew, in a way that _confirmed_ what she knew, then… well, he would find her somewhere to stay no matter what, given the fact that she was a child, but this way would feel less like charity if the girl was of the prideful sort.

"How can I convince you that this world is real, and not a dream?" He finally asked.

The blinked and raised an eyebrow at him. "Um… you can't. If this world is a dream, then anything can happen anyway. You could try to prove magic to me, but I'd blame it on the dream. You could try to show me memories, but I'd blame it on the dream. It's just not…" She trailed off, suddenly thoughtful. "Legilimency could work, I guess. I mean, I'd still blame it on the dream, but if you were to implant a belief of this being reality into my mind, then that would probably work. _But_, seeing as this _is_ a dream, then it won't work for any longer than until I wake up. The only other option is time, because if I honestly can live through several months here in perfect clarity without waking up, then there isn't really any other option."

The very idea of it… "No. I would never use legilimency on a child."

"I'm seventeen."

Dumbledore just stared at her with sad little twinkles pouring out of his eyes like dying stars.

"Well…" The girl lay back. "I suppose that leaves us at an impasse for now, eh?"

o.o.o.o.o

Konohagakure no Sato

Large blue eyes opened to complete darkness. After several seconds of shifting, Evangeline, for that was the name of the second Barrett twin, was forced to conclude that she was tied down, and under no delusions that she could escape.

"Well…" She tried to listen for any noise that could be making its way in. Was this supposed to be total sensory deprivation? For what purpose? "Hello? Is anyone there?"

"What is your name?"

Evangeline's head turned toward the voice. Let's see… answer or demand informa—of course she was going to answer. "Evangeline Barrett."

"Do you know where you are?"

"Um… no." Where had she been last? There was the airport, the plane, the cr—

The crash.

"Maybe Wyoming? Am I in a hospital?" Maybe her eyes had been damaged or something, or she'd gotten some injury that meant she couldn't see bright lights or move for a while. Or… ever… "What about Evelyne? My sister? Oh, god, is Evelyne okay? Please tell me she's o—"

"You are not in Wyoming."

Okay, that was… worrying. "Um… where am I, then?"

"That is none of your concern." The voice had a strange accent, vaguely Asian. "What is your age?"

"Seventeen." Though, come to think of it, her voice was a bit higher than it should have been…

"Country of origin?"

"United States of America." She frowned a little. "Shouldn't all this information be in my passport or something? I mean, I guess everyone's stuff was scattered all over, but I'm pretty sure I had my passport in that little pouch under my shirt, so it can't have—"

"Stop."

She did.

"State of origin?"

"Oregon. We were on our way to Florida."

"We?"

"My sister and I." Evangeline could feel the panic building up again.

"Do you know the date?" The voice continued without a beat.

"Er… the plane took off pretty late on June eighteenth, and if I haven't been out for too long, then… June nineteenth, 2013?" Evangeline hazarded a guess. "I'm really not all that sure."

"I see." There was several seconds of a pen scratching on a paper, and rustling cloth, before Evangeline suddenly heard the person stand up. "There will be someone in to see you shortly."

There was a bright rectangle of light, gone before she could adjust enough to see who had been in to see her.

Okay, _what?_

…At least she wasn't blind.

o.o.o.o.o

Several minutes of silence later, the lights snapped on fully, and heavy footsteps were all she heard.

She turned her head to the left in an attempt to see who it was, but she couldn't make the figure out yet, not even whilst squinting.

"Evangeline Barrett, eh?" The accent was the same as the last one, but the voice was different. It was older, deeper, rougher. "You're lucky we have a few people who speak English here. Most places around here don't have any real use for it."

"Er…"

"Do you want to know where you are?" The voice questioned, and just as her eyes began to adjust enough to see what was going on, a light piece of fabric, maybe a scarf, was thrown over her eyes. "Sorry." He didn't sound sorry at all; he even chuckled. "You aren't allowed to see anything yet, though we'll fix that soon."

Evangeline grit her teeth. "Yes, I want to know where I am."

"I don't think you do."

"What."

More chuckling, and Evangeline couldn't quite make herself calm down about it. "Mm… do you know why you're in this situation?"

"No, but I'd like to. Or at least, I'll say that I want to, since you seem to be making all my decisions for me."

The man laughed again. "Oh, feisty. That's good. The truth is, we decided to hold you down here for several reasons, the most obvious being that you quite literally came out of nowhere."

"…I don't follow."

"The person who found you explained that there was a bright flash of light, and then you were just suddenly there."

"Are you trying to make a joke?"

"No, that is legitimately what happened." The man chuckled. "Obviously, we checked your belongings for identification, and after finding a number of… inconsistencies, shall we say… we decided to check a few other things."

"You went through my stuff?" That was just, just… okay, so if _any_ of this was true, they had a legit reason to go through her belongings, but still.

"Yes, we did. We were particularly interested in a certain magazine we found." There was a smile in the man's voice. The fabric was suddenly pulled off her eyes, and as her sight adjusted, she noted that the face in front of her was rather familiar.

"Is this supposed to be some sort of joke? Because it really isn't funny."

"No."

"…I call bullshit."

Jiraiya just smirked back.

o.o.o.o.o

**A/N: Eep! I'm late. Sorry about that.**

**So… nothing to say yet, though if you want clarification, Evelyne went to Hogwarts, and Evangeline went to Konoha.**

**Be on the lookout for my (also late) FaNoWriMo!**

**Ja ne,**

**Phoenix.**


End file.
